Building on some Internet math, StatsCan data, and an average pee time of 21 seconds and 6.5 pees per day, about 136people are peeing in Victoria at any given time. That’s a lot of people, which is one of the reasons it’s sad that the city lost a low-barrier washroom in April.

One of the first posts I wrote for this site was about the city’s hostile benches, where arm rests are welded or bolted on to stop people from lying down. We’ve got a lot of them, and they’re all gross. But they don’t have to be.

A review of one month of VicPD street check reports shows that officers disproportionately street check Indigenous individuals and members of the street community. The reports also include at least one street check that would appear to constitute police misconduct if it were held to Ontario’s new street check rules; officers policing sex work in a way that contradicts VicPD’s public statements; and officers using people’s fear of police to initiate processes that lead to street checks.

England is having a national conversation right now about fake public space, where more and more seemingly public spaces are actually owned by private companies. That conversation isn’t happening in Victoria, but it should be.

In 2014, Victoria, B.C. police officers street checked the city’s population at a higher rate than any other jurisdiction in Canada, with the exception of Edmonton. Victoria police performed 3,059 street checks in 2014, equivalent to 3.18 per cent of Victoria and Esquimalt’s 2011 census population. For Canadian cities where I could find statistics, that made Victoria’s street check rate the second-highest in the country.

Since the 1980s, Victoria has subjected new buildings to "Crime Prevention Through Environmental Design" (CPTED) principles. When that phrase was invented in the United States in 1971, it was with discrimination in mind. This post looks at Victoria's adoption of CPTED, and how it's shaped the city.

During the week of September 11th, 2017, I took photos of every “no loitering,” “no trespassing,” “no camping,” and “private property” sign I could findin downtown Victoria. I’ve mapped those signs here.

City staff’s latest proposal would require people camping in parks to move at least 100 metres away from their campsite after they’ve packed up in the morning, and to find a new campsite for the following night that’s the same distance away. Staff say these changes, and others, will “benefit park users in general.” But these changes aren’t for the benefit of everyone — they will negatively affect and further marginalize people who rely on our city parks to stay alive.

This post provides an update on the creeping progress of government-sanctioned defensive architecture. In April I wrote about how provincial government agencies are working with the police to come up with ways to displace people. One of those agencies is B.C.’s Environmental Assessment Office: defenders of deer, protectors of porcupines, and… shredder of shrubs?

James Bay is getting a public library in 2018, fulfilling a long-standing promise from the City of Victoria. Public libraries are well-used by homeless Victorians, and I expect the James Bay branch will be no exception. What’s interesting is that the library will be right next to a new, privately owned “public plaza.” Public libraries may be for everyone, but unfortunately our “public plazas” are not.

After Tent City was shut down, the B.C. government rented fences and hired security to close off the property for ten months, at a cost of $600,000. That’s interesting for two reasons. First, you can buy lots of things for $600,000, and second, they hid those costs from reporters and the public.